What is a rose without thorns?
by OsteoBat
Summary: The human race delves into what they were meant to let lay. Kroenen has some unfinished business and its up to one person to stop him.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: Hellboy characters do not belong to me, but all unrecognized characters do.

Kroenen watched helplessly as the giant cog plummeted toward him. How ironic was it that the spider's own trap was the one that snared him in the end? The cog landed heavily on his metal laced body, pinning him with no chance of escape.

Unable to die he heard his nemesis' speech and their departure. Unable to move he heard the great confrontation and later what could only be the fall of his idol. Unable to move, unable to die he lay their trapped in his own mind.

He felt rage and grief. He plotted ways to escape his trap that never grew to fruition. Eventually he went numb, a state like suspension. Time meant nothing because time was nothing; to him at any account, with his perfect geared heart and unmoving body.

Some short years passed and the half-man lay quietly as his mind buzzed and dimmed by parts. He reached a slumber at last and knew nothing. He dreamed.

His dreams were filled with blood and revenge upon his enemies. They were filled with beauty and peace. His night phantoms whispered black deeds and plots. Some murmured new and better ways for him to improve upon himself. His fall had proved his continued imperfection.

His sleep was not idle. Nor was it filled with forgiveness.

History is the greatest teacher of all and one of its most important lessons is the fool-hardy of human kind. They are too curious at times and often unearth things that they have no business meddling in. Such was the case now.

The excavation team deep within Russia was excited; you could taste it in the air. The cavern under the graveyard had been difficult to find but once there they had had little trouble. It had already been broken into and the traps had already sprung. Well, most of them anyway.

They were a ragtag team, of all races and nationalities. Half the group consisted of translators and the other of mercenaries. Those 'workers' were not the most usual of folk either. Most you would not want to tangle with on a dark night. In broad daylight for that matter.

Ashton Stahl sigh as she gazed out at the chasm stretched out ahead of her. She knew that to go across the chasm would be an extremely dangerous venture and they were sure to lose someone along the way. But she wanted to get there.

Her new translator, a small skittish man whose English was his third language, waited behind her to see what orders she might have. Ashton cocked her head at the problem, namely the large hole gapping inches from her boots.

A smile spread slightly on her pretty face and she turned on her heels to address the translator.

"We will bridge the gap," she said slowly and deliberately, "we will use the larger grapplings." He nodded and walked off to tell the men her orders. Ashton looked back over her shoulder at the doorway beyond, a sigh caught in her throat. Then she followed the man down the passage to their camp, hoping her superiors would approve her decision.

In the end they could find no better alternative and granted the mission to her. The only annoyance was that one of her superiors, a Russian man named Jokull, wanted to oversee the operation. She had nodded her head and left the tent to prepare her men. What else could she do?

It took two days to bridge the gap using steel cables and large machinery. Then another two to knock down the iron wall, which was not bad but still irritating. They lost one man when a metal cable snapped. Then three more men plummeted to their deaths when transporting equipment across the gap. No one complained, this was what they were being paid for after all.

From there they had cautiously gone forward, Ashton leading the way until they found a room with a huge circular pit in the center. She had stalled the men and scouted ahead, finding the room empty but for the pit and what she knew resided there.

Where the rumors true? After all, the information they got from inside the BPRD was not always accurate. This matched the agent's description completely though. She walked to the edge of the pit with the rusted metal inside of it.

Jokull marched up to her position and gazed down at the pit.

"He could be very valuable," said the giant man slowly in rough English, "but it is a risk to even retrieve him. He was known for being dangerous, yes." Ashton nodded. The man trapped beneath them was not their main quarry for the mission, but he could be ever so useful to them….

"We will have to decide how to detain him should he prove uncooperative" she stated before turning sharply to brief the men.

Jokull stared after her before glancing down again at the monstrous cog. A small grim smile worked its way onto his face before disappearing again into the moist air.

He followed Ashton back to the men.

"What are we doing working under a _woman_ anyway," grumbled a man. Several others echoed his complaint. Several more leveled glares at Ashton as she reentered the room.

"Its not like she has any idea what is going on, heck if it weren't for us none of this could get done," said another. Their malevolence grew and boiled from being in such close quarters with their bitterness.

Slowly it spread through the men, settling on a dozen in particular and one man more than the rest. Peter was a rough British man who wouldn't have looked odd among a team of tough lumberjacks.

He stood, slightly drunk on his boasts, and swaggered toward the woman that dared presume to lead them.

Ashton looked up at the shadow that fell over her. She was not a small woman but this fellow towered over her. His unshaven face grimaced down at her and she wondered why.

"There is no way on this green earth that me and the boys here are going ta listen to yer orders any more. We know how to get this done and we don't need no woman to tell us how." The men behind him muttered encouragements and agreements.

Ashton sighed and put down the chart she had been reading. "Is that a threat?" she asked calmly.

"No it's an order," he returned haughtily. She smiled at him helpfully.

"Are you sure there is no way I can change your mind on this, you are all of an accord?" After several seconds of delay where translators spoke the in-between many of the workers nodded.

"Well then," replied Ashton as she began to shed her long coat, "I suppose then I will have to convince you." The men's faces seemed to droop as they saw what the coat had been concealing. A revolver and a long knife hung from belts about her hips and another pistol laid snuggly in a shoulder holster.

Ashton handed her weapon belts and coat to a Jordanian translator whom she had befriended. The small dark woman smiled mysteriously.

"Well then lad, it looks like you are going to have to kick me out." The man sneered at her proposal to fight . Not only was she female she was diminutive compared to him.

Of course Ashton knew; you didn't have to be big if you were crazy.

Seeing the man unwilling to attack her she struck like lightening, her fist instantly breaking his nose, before dodging back before he could grab her. He roared and lunged at her and she jumped back again, but not before scoring a hit on his right eye.

As usual when she fought hand to hand she wished that she was heavier; but her lithe build kept her fleet and agile. Plus she would never out bull men like the one before her. Her hits still found their mark and he would feel them in time.

A rush filled her. Was it fear or was it adrenaline? It didn't matter really, thought Ashton; the result was still the same.

The man charged her like a bull, leading with his head and shoulders low. She kicked him in the mouth.

On and on it went like that, the man's clumsy swings to her snake like scores. It didn't last long before he was on the ground wheezing for breath and clutching his face. Ashton straightened and looked all of the men in the eye one by one.

"Anyone else for a go?" seeing no takers she addressed them in a loud and commanding voice.

"See here, you have two choices. I can either out work you, or I can out fight you, it's your decision." None of the men offered resistance and Ashton smiled grimly.

Ihssan, the Jordanian translator, handed her gear back to her, the mysterious smile still on her face. Ashton nodded and began to strap her weapons on as the men around her gave her a new look of respect.

In the end they decided on magnets. What else to hold an indestructible man made partly of metal? They had brought in the radiographic equipment and Ashton dropped into the pit after they lower the machine in. Hopefully the cog wouldn't interfere with the image. If they were lucky they could find just what metals the scientist had melded into himself.

Turning the equipment just so and pushing several buttons and she began to shoot images. After only an hour and a half she was ready to be hauled back up.

With no lab she had to develop the film the old fashioned way, but in a tunnel complex it wasn't as hard as it could have been, with lots of dark abandoned rooms. Miraculously the film came through, if hazy. Ashton grinned crookedly, there was defiantly steel in their man.

The huge magnet was in place and the small cranes were waiting to lift the cog.

"What if the magnet has an adverse side effect?" she yelled over the sound of machinery at Jokull. "Might it not possibly kill him?"

Jokull only glared at her from across the room and resumed watching the men work. Ashton shrugged and went to help the men set the magnet and begin to charge it. The sound of the magnet being powered filled the room with throbbing, like a huge invisible heart. The cog was of the wrong metal to be attracted to the magnet luckily.

At last there was no going back and the lifts were utilized. The cog slowly rose, higher and higher. Finally it lifted past the lip of the pit and was maneuvered over the side. It rang out like a church bell as it was set on the stone floor.

Ashton noted several of the men draw pistols and shift nervously. They had a right to be nervous. She strode up to the pit and looked down. There he was, skewed like so much skis kabob. He didn't move and she began to worry. Then he twitched and a soft moan was heard over the machinery.

"What is wrong, what is happening?" asked Jokull anxiously.

"He's rusty" Ashton replied.

He was staring at her. Well, at least, that is what it appeared like. When you had no eyelids it was rather difficult not to stare.

He was unconscious, or at a state somewhat near it according to the monitoring machines. Knowing he was 'sleeping' and therefore unable to see her Ashton came to stand next to the table he was strapped to.

Scarred flesh and mangled features met her. He was physically gruesome but Ashton was not repelled. It wasn't so much worse than the patients she had seen in hospitals.

She glanced at a monitor. The reading stated that he was in a deep state of unconsciousness, nearer to true coma than anything else. Embodied by this she reached out with her ungloved right hand and traced the air above his face, a hair's breath from the man's skin.

Behind her the monitor's readings began to shift.

Tentatively she touched the scared tissue, careful no to stray to the parts not protected by skin. Her eyes focused on the point where her fingers touched his cheek. She gave a brief glance up to his gapping orbs and then quickly back. Those blank, empty eyes were no longer staring or empty. He was looking at her. Too late Ashton noticed his deeper breathing and muscle tension.

Taking her hand away from his face she addressed him.

"Good morning," she said in accented German, "how are you feeling?"

He said nothing.

After several long moments of silence Ashton's face grew a wry expression of annoyance and she yelled over her shoulder for Jon, her translator.

Jon hurried into the room, his appearance a chaotic disaster in contrast with Ashton's, with her white lab coat and long hair pulled back into a tight braid.

"Would you please inform the good doctor here," Jon blanched at her use of the word 'doctor', "that we know he can speak and that we may be able to…benefit one another."

Just as Jon was opening his mouth to translate he was interrupted by a voice raspy from disuse.

"English is not above me, 'good doctor'", the man on the table responded, throwing Ashton's words back at her, but in a most courteous manner possible.

Ashton raised one tawny eyebrow and smirked in amusement.

"I am pleased to make your acquaintance doctor." She stated with a slight stiff bow. "Leave us Jon, the doctor and I have much to discuss."

The translator quickly left, glancing furtively back over his shoulder.

"So I will illiterate, how are you feeling?" the blond woman standing over Kroenen asked.

"Restrained" he replied, gesturing with his head at all of the straps confining him to the table.

"Don't worry about that," Ashton answered, "that is purely for our protection."


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: Hellboy characters do not belong to me, but all unrecognized characters do.

FlyingFish15: thank you so much for the first comment, truth be told it gave me the confidence to write more. I hope I can keep my story up to standards.

whitefang4ever: thank you and I will try.

amyltrer: thank you, the doctor is rather frustrating to write realistically (for me at least),

To the readers: thank you again for reading. knowing that someone out there is viewing this and not sending me hate mail in response brings me much happiness. now, what direction would you guys like this story to go? I would be interested in suggestions. thanks!

Chapter 2:

Peter was humiliated and for a man like Peter humiliation could be deadly. That woman was going to pay.

It wasn't like he had a problem with women, even with females in authority. But the fact that she had beaten him, had socially emasculated him; that was what had him boiling till his blood seemed frothy.

Then to add insult to injury, as if making him a lesson for the whole crew wasn't enough, as soon as they had dug up the mutant she had been reassigned.

Now she was babysitting the butchered up corpse and the team was doing underground camp jobs. Sure, some of the men had been relieved to finally find saner jobs but Peter had counted on the danger to win back his manhood.

Now he had to do it the old fashioned way.

With a .9mm shoved through the back of his jeans he approached one of the private medical tents.

He entered and saw Stahl talking with two other people next to the breathing cadaver. He would have to make this fast. His arm bent around his back to draw his pistol. He swung the gun around.

BANG!

Peter was confused, he hadn't pulled the trigger yet, he was sure. Fortunately his confusion didn't last long, mere milliseconds actually. Because before he could even ponder his dilemma he fell over quite dead on the stone floor.

"Sorry about that" said Ashton loudly as all their ears rang from the muzzle blast. She lowered her revolved and replaced it back into its holster.

After staring at the corpse in front of her with large eyes, Ihssan glanced over at Ashton. "Exactly what caliber was that?" she asked.

".22"

At Ihssan's continued look Ashton explained.

"It doesn't normally matter how big the bullet is, its how you aim"

The other standing occupant, a man of middling years, cocked an eyebrow.

"I shot him in the eye." She added.

Kroenen watched the whole exchange from the medical table. He wasn't impressed by any means but obviously the woman knew how to handle herself. Why, he hadn't even realized that she was armed.

The blond walked over to the body and relieved it of the pistol, hiding the gun somewhere under her white coat.

"We had better find someone to clean this up."

Before they departed, the Aryan-like woman taking the rear, she glanced over at him and seeing his mask turned toward her, she nodded at him. And then she was gone.

The assassin immediately began to work on his restraints. Vaguely he wondered why the woman was letting him continue releasing himself. She knew of his impending escape. As if anything they devised could hold him! Yet she never sounded an alarm.

Seeing that he could not find the answer within himself he let the question drop from his mind to be stored for later introspection. For now he had a date with a heavy canvas strap.

She prodded the wound with a scalpel, not being overly careful to be gentle. The man shifted under the knife. Kroenen had succeeded in freeing his arms completely. Yet he had not yet disappeared. Perhaps he was as curious about her as she was of him.

_Self-flatter_, she told herself internally.

The body beneath her had changed since its confinement. Stitches had disintegrated leaving only scars behind. Some muscle too had faded, but what was left held great promise.

Ashton knew she should have been afraid of the man lying before her, and indeed she was, but it was a distant thing. Like seeing a snake about to strike and only feeling calm detachment. Her scalpel blade pressed too hard on the tender skin, drawing liquid. A shudder ran through the man.

"So what are your plans for the future?" she asked as she applied alcohol to the small cut. He didn't answer her and she hadn't really expected him to.

She turned around to pick up some gauze and felt cool, sharp steel at her throat and a hand wrap hard fingers around her wrist.

She stiffened and froze, but was not really surprised. Apparently he hadn't been as contained as she had thought he still was. She swallowed and the blade's edge scraped her skin.

"The scalpel?"

"Of course," was his reply. He swung his legs off the table and stood up, urging her forward for room. Ashton heard the sheet fall to the floor. The man behind her nudged her forward again with a knee and a 'pardon me."

"I'm sorry for all this, but you must understand; it's completely necessary." Ashton wasn't in a position to argue.

They found Ashton unconscious on the ground and the Nazi assassin absent. An alarm was sounded but all but fools realized that the man was long gone. Her superiors blamed her naturally, so they gave her the impossible task of tracking him down.

As she bagged her few belongings she wondered how she was going to do just that. She wasn't foolish enough not to realize that he could kill her easily. In fact she was confused as to why he hadn't finished her when he escaped.

"Perhaps I should have gone ahead and gotten my doctorate."

"Liar" said Ihssan from the opposite side of the tent. "You are enjoying this too much."

Ashton grinned in agreement. Her pack was almost full.

"Why do you think he spared me?" she asked her friend quietly. Ihssan watched her pack her few belongings; some books, her weapons including a sniper rifle, and some other odds and ends.

"Who knows, maybe it wasn't worth the effort. Maybe he doesn't randomly kill absolutely everything he comes into contact with. Heck, maybe you confused him. You certainly have half the camp on its toes when you walk by." This said with a wicked expression.

"I'm going to miss you Ihssan" said Ashton as she embraced the smaller woman, "if I survive I'll write." This said only half jokingly. And then she left and the Persian woman was alone in the tent wondering if she would ever see Ashton alive again.

Such things were beyond her control of course, so she shrugged dark shoulders and walked back to her post.

Kroenen sat on a roof several miles from the graveyard, confident that none would spot him in the scant light. He was as still as a gargoyle and a barn cat jumped on the roof beside him and seemed unaware of his presence.

It was all gone. His gods would not answer his calls and he had not the power to call Rasputin back. So with all that he had worked to build in the world beyond reach, what was he to do?

His logically trained mind pondered the issue; turning is over in his head. Some ideas seemed too simple, some past comprehension, even to one such as him. At last he couldn't think of anything more fitting. The thought had traveled through his mind many times in his internment, yet now that he was free it seemed unfitting. But there it was.

Revenge.

But against who? He had no idea if those who had defeated him were even still alive and he wasn't one to attack ignorant descendents. There was no point to it. There was always the BPRD. The least he could do was to stop by and pay them a visit.

He sighed behind his mask and dropped his chin into his hand. The cat jumped into the air with a yowl and scrambled off the roof.

_But I'm getting ahead of myself. I need to regain my power first. I will not be unprepared. _

If he had been capable of the action he would have smiled in satisfaction. There was time for revenge soon enough. He had a power structure to rebuild.

He glanced at one arm, seeming to see the scared flesh even though it was covered in the worn cloth of his suit. He also had some 'repairs' to do as well.

The beggar's body cooled rapidly in the air of the abandoned barn. Not Kroenen's ideal lab but at the moment it would have to do. The homeless drunkard hadn't lasted long and perhaps that was for the best, flailers tended to become annoying fast.

With a long suffering sigh he put down his scalpel and put his hands on his hips. His apron was covered in blood and other bodily fluids. That had been pointless. Of all the wretches that he could have pulled out of the gutter he had the fortune to have one with hemophilia.

"How did you ever survive this long?" he asked the dead man, his voice odd from having no lips to control the inflections. He felt muscles move in his face, the ghosts of expressions. With no lips or eyebrows though, they were doomed to silence.

No use wasting a perfectly good body. After all, there were some things you could only do with a corpse. He picked his scalpel back up.

Ashton sighed happily and put down her duffel bag. Home sweet home. She wondered where her roommates were. No matter, she would see them soon enough. Before she left again at least.

The clatter of china was heard in the kitchen and she walked around the wall that made the kitchen a separate 'room' from the rest of the house. She saw Bre and Ann happily eating ice-cream.

Bre was the first to see her, or more correctly, a dark clothed person walk seemingly out of thin air and into the kitchen. She drew a butcher knife from the drawer with all the ferocity of a Viking. Then she noticed who she was threatening and relaxed.

"I thought you were afraid of knives Bre."

"I am" she answered Ashton, "when anyone else is holding one."

Ashton threw back her head and laughed, finally able to relax since her whole ordeal had started. Who would ever have believed that this had begun only six months ago?

"So how did your trip go?" interjected Ann as she scooped another spoon of mint chocolate into her mouth.

"It's still going," she said dryly and begun to give them a much edited version of the event since she had left.

"…so that's when he apparently knocked me out and ran." The two other girls sat quietly as she concluded.

"So they blamed you" said Ann

"And are sending you out to get him, because they aren't willing to do it themselves." added Bre.

"That's the jest of it ladies. Though that isn't what is bothering me so much." The two lovers looked at her expectantly.

"I want to know why, I mean not so much about his current actions, but what…well to explain, he was a …masochist of sort and he…enjoyed cutting himself." The girls nodded, self mutilation was not so rare nowadays.

"I just don't understand why he did it. The closest thing I can think of by comparison is when I periodically peeled all of the skin off my hands when I was little. But that's different, it usually didn't hurt." She put her chin in her hands in a huff, frustrated with her questions, not even noticing the surprised expressions on her friend's faces.

"Some people are just different Ash," said Bre gently, "you don't know what is going on inside their minds."

Ashton nodded her agreement. "But why, what does he see?"

"What was the reason?"


	3. Chapter 3

Kroenen looked at the dirt floor of the barn, in the corner where he had neatly stacked the bodies once he had finished with them.

_I might have some explaining to do if anyone ever wonders in. Of course I could always use more company. _

Such was his madness that he didn't even seem to realize the slight error in this view of the situation. That and the fact that 'guests' didn't stay that way for any amount of time.

The pseudo-doctor sighed; he seemed to be doing that more of late. So far he had not been doing much with his work. Perhaps he was going through what they called 'writer's block' in a way. He knew he knew the answers, but seemed unable to call them forth.

_I'm just distracted_, he decided, _I need a change of scenery…and more thread_. He was making progress with his self alterations, but it was going slow. He just couldn't decide where he was at fault. He knew he was less than perfect, but how?

He shed his apron, now permanently brown red in color, and headed out of the barn that had become his kingdom.

Every establishment needed a name and this one was no different. The company went by Outlier Management Inc. It was a fitting name. OMI had been started in the sixties, its true origins a contract written up and signed on a boat out in international waters.

It was rumored that the original owners had intermarried for security and power reasons, it kept the company stable. No one seemed to know who those men and women were who pulled the strings that kept the enterprise going though. Lessens the likelihood for assassination attempts you see.

Since its origins weren't 'officially' accepted by any country they weren't limited in their clientele. Their expertises were up for the highest bidder. Very profitable.

Often they were called in to aid or inform governmental agencies, such as the BPRD and its brethren. Because they were in effect a mercenary enterprise, they were not bound by the admittedly loose codes that governmentally funded organizations followed.

OMI had no loyalties, other than good business. Some countries they allied themselves with more than others, generally for prompt payment and reliable information.

Neutrality was the name of the game and the ability to look around previously accepted practices. Now that sounded pretty on paper. They were never want for business.

Kroenen had finally relocated. It had been somewhat difficult but there were always ways around obstacles.

He had come to loath metal detectors.

When pondering his move he had decided that it was time to go home. Germany seemed to be whispering his name in the wind.

Finally he reached Berlin; the cities mass population cloaked his existence there. He found his homeland changed. Through his and Ilsa's exile they had avoided German, perhaps not ready to reopen the old wound.

He didn't know why he was surprised, after all Germany had to have developed along with its neighbors, but for some reason he was sick to see his country as it was now. A mongrel mass of human cattle, with no order or ideal to strive for. A broken system from the one he had left.

He kept to the shadows mostly, with Ilsa no longer there acting as the front for the two, he had no way to interact with the general populous. He found an abandoned factory with an intact bomb shelter beneath.

It would do, with a few modifications on his part. He went to work, with all the efficiency of a machine but with a drive that was distinctly human. Less than a week after he entered the crumbling building an ignorant visitor would have thought that the place was a quaint hospital from years past. Or a mental health facility.

That same visitor would have been pounced upon and sacrificed to science soon after.

Kroenen was pleased and the world would have done well to recoil.

The BPRD didn't have a 'night shift'. It went through twelve hour long watches similar to a hospital. And if you went into a hospital and asked the staff at what time that emergencies happen they will tell you at night and especially on the full moon. The BPRD didn't escape this tendency, but for entirely different reasons. So the building was always lighted and always awake.

One of the agents, an in descript fellow, sat in a hallway, waiting for his shift to end. It was three o'clock in the morning and on a waning moon. Beasties almost never attacked at this time. Too close to dawn and the moon too ordinary.

All agent Calloway wanted was to end his shift, take off his suit, and tell his fiancé a jacked up story about 'work'. Luckily she was a trusting creature and simply took his stories on face value.

Today he wasn't going to get to lie to his girlfriend.

A shadow seemed to lengthen around the hall. The agent didn't notice. It slide farther down the floor. The agent checked his watch. A soft hissing sound was masked by the air conditioner kicking on.

A man slumped on the floor, a pool of blood spreading silently.

Kroenen wiped his baton blade on the agent's suit and slid it into its scabbard. This was too easy. He walked on, his footfalls not making a sound on the linoleum floor. A camera watched his progress.

Two hours later.

The BPRD was in chaos. Agents were running around, emergency lights were flashing, the alarms were blaring. Cameras had detected an intruder but no one seemed able to locate him.

Several top agents were staring at the recorded images, sweat dripping into their eyes. Hearts hammering they spoke in hushed whispers. Wasn't it odd that only a few cameras had viewed the assassin in the facility and that they could not find where he had entered?

This survey room was only one of many in the facility, but it was one of the few with all of the camera's images. It also had no security devices within it.

Out of the dim cast by the view screens a slender form slipped. Their eyes trained on the screens the agents detected Kroenen too late.

Within moments Kroenen seated himself comfortably on one of the padded swivel chairs, watching the screens with no little amusement. Some of the agents' bodies twitched, with either reflexes or the last desperate attempts of life. He didn't worry; even if any of them survived he had disarmed their ability to harm him. Tendons were such fragile things after all.

He sat back and relaxed. They wouldn't find him any time soon in the small security room. And he could watch all of their moves, like rats in a maze.

The OMI and the BPRD had a love hate relationship. As in the BPRD saw the OMI as a necessary evil and the OMI loved the government's business. So when the BPRD's security was breached and dozens of agents slaughtered they called the OMI to investigate.

Through the information grape vine of the OMI Ashton learned that it had probably been her target that had done the deed. This basically gave her free access to the BPRD crisis.

She watched the security tapes, finally coming to the last one. It was of one of the perimeter cameras. It showed a slender human figure walking out of the gate, pause, turn about to face the camera, and wave jauntily before striding away.

No wonder the BPRD was terrified. Well, besides the deaths of, what was it, 63 agents in four days time, its security had been reduced to child's play.

But that had been a week ago. Now the question was where was he now?

"Found you" whispered Ashton to the screen, a nervous whine in her voice. She swallowed in fear even as she stared in wonder. If a creature like that could be persuaded to join the OMI…

"Ms. Stahl," said the agent next to her, "Ms. Stahl we have more to show you. You said you wanted to see the bodies." Ashton nodded and followed him from the room.

The morgue was a level under the one they had left. It was covered with steel, a very futuristic and sterile environment. The only things that were organic in the room were thirteen cloth covered tables. Under the sheets were a few select victims of Kroenen's massacre.

Ashton pulled back the sheets and began to examine the bodies dispassionately.

"Beautiful" she whispered at the dark work. Every cut was made with surgical precision, the placement perfect. No waste, simple efficiency. The agent who had escorted her winced.

"How can you say that", he challenged emotionally.

Ashton cocked her head at him for his reaction and glanced back at the corpses. They resembled wax figures more than anything human. There was nothing left.

"Dead is dead sir, they aren't people anymore, just carcasses. Everyone dies and while I do feel remorse for the family left behind, I don't feel sorry for these men. Who knows what will happen to them now, but they aren't here anymore." The agent blinked at her speech and looked away.

Ashton continued. "And while what he did was 'wrong' how he did it was remarkable. Have you ever seen such skill, such power over a person's environment? I don't agree with what he did but I respect how he did it." She turned from the agent and walked over to a rack on the wall which held lab coats, surgical masks, and goggles.

For the next few hours she searched and examined the bodies, looking for some clue. At last she realized that she was getting nowhere and quit the room. All that she had found was already on file. He was an amazing and frightening monster, a doctor and killed turned into one.

She walked with the agent back up a level and was given a quiet room on her request. Taking her bag from her shoulder she slipped out her laptop and began to type her report.

It started with the most basic information. Name Karl Ruprecht Kroenen. Born in 1897, some past history. Presumed to be in an unidentified undead state. Some other odd facts, mental disorders and such like.

"You were one messed up person." Muttered Ashton as she typed her report on the wounds found on the agents. The body charts she would have to copy from the BPRD's records.

She finished her report by adding her ideas on where he might be hiding, saved the document, and turned off her computer. She exited the room to see her fellow OMI employee leaning on the opposite wall, waiting for her.

Alex Chen was a Chinese American via India. He smiled at her roguishly, clashing with the entire complex with his messy black hair and goatee.

"So how is your 'divorce' going Ash" he said with a devilish grin and Ashton only shook her head in reply, used to the man's antics.

So the two operatives caught up to one another, usually by trading good natured insults and threats. The agent with Ashton looked a bit off balanced by the whole affair.

Life stories condensed down to a five minute conversation they parted to do their individual jobs. Ashton left the compound and drove to the tiny apartment paid for by the OMI. It was a run-down place with peeling wallpaper and some of the boldest cockroaches she had ever met. That and she was pretty sure there was a prostitute using the room next to hers. This was backed up by the dramatic screaming she had heard last night, in thirty minute intervals, and the woman's costume. Lovely.

But hey, it was free and they did wash the sheets here. She had slept in worse places after all.

Ashton locked the door, slipped a pistol under her pillow, and curled up to sleep.


End file.
